Articles
News
Music
Photography
Video
Stories
Buy
Links
Miscellaneous
Do Something
Circle!
Mailing List
Message Board
maintained by:
Brian Bieluch
leave your thoughts/
tribute to Harry:
check out the guestbook
|
Home
> Music >
Last Stand
Last Stand
by Harry Chapin
It used to be that old John Wayne
Would fight the good fight once again,
Find the strength to bear the pain,
Stand up til he'd finally fall. But now it's not just movie time,
And now it's you that's on the line.
And now it's you that's going to find
If you can stand at all.
So you circle all the wagons
And you hide behind the trees,
And you try to find some courage on your knees.
When you heard the sound of taps played
By the one man band,
You knew this is where you'd have to make
Your last stand.
And so, my friends, the last stand,
The last song from the last band,
The last note from the last man,
But you gave it all you can.
The cards came down to the last deal,
You're a starving man at his last meal,
And the movie's rolled down to the last real,
It's got an ending you never planned. She's left you now, and so it seems,
You've tumbled down the last stream,
And you've found out that the final dream,
Can disappear so fast. Watch it all just fade away, boy,
It came down to the last day,
And then the last out, and then the last play,
And you're alone at last.
So you circle all the wagons
And you hide behind the trees,
And you try to find some courage on your knees.
When you heard the sound of taps played
By the one man band,
You knew this is where you'd have to make
Your last stand.
Well, so it was late last night,
She left on the final flight
You watched as the last light
Went out there in your soul.
Took your look around the top,
For now you face the final drop.
You'll go down fast and you won't stop,
You found a very deep hole. Say you're off on the last ride,
Remembering how she last cried,
And you know that love had long last died
In silence, not in pain. You lost your last, your last race
Stumbled in last place,
Too late to find the one last face
Waiting in the rain. So you circle all the wagons
And you hide behind the trees,
And you try to find some courage on your knees.
When you heard the sound of taps played
By the one man band,
You knew this is where you'd have to make
Your last stand.
Layout, design, images, and user-contributed text are © Copyright 1996-2017 HarryChapin.com: The Harry Chapin Archive.
"Oh, if a man tried to take his time on earth and prove before he died what one man's life could be worth, I wonder what would happen to this world?" -- Harry Chapin, 1942-1981.
|
|
|
The Latest Release
|
Sniper & Other Love Songs
[iTunes]
In 1972, Harry released
Sniper & Other Love Songs.
Thirty years would pass before the album would ever reach the CD format. Sniper was finally re-released in June, 2002.
Originally given a working title of Sweet City Suite, the album tells the story of various characters one might run into in
a city. The album features the original studio versions of Chapin classics "A Better Place to Be" and "Circle." But
perhaps more importantly (as those songs are already well-distributed on compilation CDs), the album features seemingly
lost Chapin stories, including "And the Baby Never Cries," "Burning Herself," "Barefoot Boy," and "Woman Child."
Sniper is for the seasoned Chapin fan. New fans would do better to check out
Greatest Stories
Live. But for Chapin fans who have reached the level of the
Dance Band on the Titanic album, this is the next step. Slightly over-produced and having a little of the "forced"
feel that some of Harry's studio albums possess, this album does not capture the powerfully live Harry Chapin. Nonetheless,
it captures Harry's great iconoclastic songwriting--Harry takes the story song to new heights here. But the album works best
for those ready for it; don't buy it until you are ready to appreciate it!
|
|
|
